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FlyingTexan

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jul 13, 2015
877
601

I don’t have 5G with my ATT plan. Honestly not anything I’d notice. My 4G seems fast enough to do everything I want. Are there upgrades coming to the 13 mini’s the 4G antennas where it might be more power efficient?
 

now i see it

macrumors G4
Jan 2, 2002
10,724
22,557
If you go to AT&T's website, they have a 5G coverage map. Pretty much everywhere they'll show their Fake 5G service which is enhanced 4G and almost nowhere they'll show true millimeter wave 5G (the really fast stuff requiring line of sight to the tower).
If you get a new 5G iPhone and use it on AT&T's network, you won't notice any difference compared to LTE (4G) just about everywhere.
Bottom line: almost no one on AT&T will benefit from the hype of super fast speeds that 5G has been touted.
 

Closingracer

macrumors 601
Jul 13, 2010
4,308
1,840
If you go to AT&T's website, they have a 5G coverage map. Pretty much everywhere they'll show their Fake 5G service which is enhanced 4G and almost nowhere they'll show true millimeter wave 5G (the really fast stuff requiring line of sight to the tower).
If you get a new 5G iPhone and use it on AT&T's network, you won't notice any difference compared to LTE (4G) just about everywhere.
Bottom line: almost no one on AT&T will benefit from the hype of super fast speeds that 5G has been touted.

Isn’t Verizon the only carrier with any substantial amount of mmWave out in public use ? AT&T and Verizon both have substantial amount of C Band to use which should be started to be deployed by the end of the year and I know at least the iPhone supports the verizon bands of c band.
 

Powerbooky

macrumors demi-god
Mar 15, 2008
597
499
Europe
On that area there's not much innovation to expect. Reception/transmission efficiency of 3/4/5G phones depends for the most part on external factors: weather conditions, where the phone is located, how you hold it (cover it) and of course the physical- and network configuration of the cell tower itself. In fact cell towers steer the transmission power of each connected phone to get the most optimal connection. But if badly configured by the operator your battery can be drained much much more. For example if the network itself broadcasts lots of unsolicited traffic to all its clients, it will drain all those phones much more.
 
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